Jim Handy, Objective Analysis, on SSDs

CEO Change at Fusion-io

On May 9 Objective Analysis sent an Alert to our clients discussing the prior day’s CEO change at Fusion-io.

In a nutshell, co-founders David Flynn (CEO) and Rick White (Chief Marketing Officer) have left the firm, with Flynn being replaced by board member Shane Robison, HP’s former Chief Strategy Officer, who helped put together HP’s acquisition of Autonomy.

Here are some of the points made in the Alert:

Flynn and White will remain on the board for another 12 months

Robison told Bloomberg that there was “no disagreement on strategy” behind the change

Fusion-io has given some advance notice for prior friendly CEO transitions, which was not the case this time

The company’s strategy has kept it a step or two ahead of its competition. Its success will hinge on continuing in this direction.

In our report: The Enterprise SSD: Technologies and Markets, Objective Analysis forecast that the PCIe SSD market would consistently out-perform the SAS SSD market. The SSD Guy certainly hopes that Fusion-io can continue to retain its prominent position in this promising market despite the change in leadership.